


Warmth and Light

by kouredios



Category: Toby Daye - Seanan McGuire
Genre: Gen, Yuletide Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-25
Updated: 2012-12-25
Packaged: 2017-11-22 09:58:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 422
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/608563
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kouredios/pseuds/kouredios
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Toby's ambivalent about Christmas.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Warmth and Light

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Kass](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kass/gifts).



> Threw this together Christmas morning when I heard you hadn't gotten a story. Hope you like it!

Toby’s gait stuttered as she walked up to the front door. She sighed; internally, she thought, but Tybalt’s chuckle from beside her told a different story. 

“Why the malaise?” he asked, eyebrow cocked. “This was your idea. We can turn around and spend the evening back at your apartment; it makes no difference to me.”

Toby shrugged. “No, we’re here. And I have presents for the kids. It’s just that...I have a complicated relationship with Christmas.” That was kind of an understatement. Amandine didn’t celebrate Christmas, for all that she tried to be a true human-style faerie bride for that short amount of time before Toby’s changeling’s choice came upon her. Christmas wasn’t a Faerie holiday. For one, faeries didn’t mind the longer nights at all. For another, the solstices didn’t exist in the Summerlands. For a third, the Nativity story was pure myth. Well, that’s what Amandine always said, anyway. “Worse even than the stories they tell about us, as far as historical accuracy,” she sniffed, the one time Toby had asked her about it. 

But Toby’s human father always brought her one beloved present on Christmas eve, until she was taken from him and he no longer could. And it was impossible to live among the mortals and not be completely inundated with Christmas...everything. Every year. The carols, the decorations, the Christmas merchandise filling the stores earlier and earlier every year, so she had to tolerate looking at it for even longer every holiday season. She didn’t _hate_ Christmas, not really. It just wasn’t _hers_. 

But Stacy and Mitch had adopted Christmas traditions for their clan, and had invited her and Tybalt to Christmas eve dinner at their house. And her love for both them and the kids, and the sense that this house was one of the few places where she truly _belonged_...well, a little Christmas ambivalence was nothing compared to the comfort of that feeling.

She looked up at Tybalt, grabbing his hand. “I’m fine. Really.” She smiled to punctuate her claim, and he smirked back at her while squeezing her hand. “Lead on, milady.”

Toby opened the door without knocking, confident that she belonged here, and was instantly surrounded by warmth and light, the smells of the cooking turkey and pine needles wafting through the air, and the cheers of the children as they greeted her. The house glowed golden and green, and Christmas, in that instant felt a little like Faerie after all.

“Merry Christmas to all!” she exclaimed, and crossed the threshold.


End file.
